Kampung Boy by Lat
Published by First Second Books
$16.95
ISBN: 1596431210

One of the primary reasons I read is to escape. It’s what I’m really looking for when I sit down with a book: I want to be transported somewhere else. If I’m also educated somehow through the experience, so much the better. That’s when I know I’ve been blessed by a story.

Kampung Boy offered both escape and education right off the bat. I knew going into it that I was going to get to experience life in a rural, Southeast Asian village as a native experiences it. Never done that before. So, I looked forward to it.

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Marvel’s mysterious “Agent M” liveblogs last week’s creative summit at Marvel:

While Joe Quesada was out of the room, his phone went off. Joe has a very interesting ring. Bendis thought he was going crazy and Brubaker thought it was a deceased dictator. Good times.

Now: LUNCH!
Mexican awesomeness! Tacos and tostadas and all that jazz. Back soon!

“Good times,” indeed.

The Internet was abuzz late last week over this comic strip by conservative cartoonist Chris Muir, in which he attempts to satirize Hillary Clinton’s efforts to appeal to an African-American audience by drawing her in blackface and having her talk in a patently offensive Negro dialect. Dirk has an impressive round-up (scroll down to digital media) of the various thoughts on the strip, both from the left and the right. You can also check out some various blog posts on the matter here. And, if you’ve never seen Muir’s strip before, there’s an interview with the artist in question here.

While I’m willing to give Muir the benefit of the doubt, I think the image of a someone in blackface, never mind a U.S. Senator campaigning for the presidency, is too loaded and wounding an issue to use to make a subtle political point in a comic strip. Certainly not the way Muir does here at any rate.

What do you think?

The mighty Anime News Network has the 411 on Fanfare/Ponent Mon’s upcoming “nouvelle manga” releases for the rest of the year. It includes a heckuva number of books by the recently Eisner-nominated Jiro Taniguchi (“The Walking Man”). Jog delves into the details:

The Fall is set to bring a 1999 Taniguchi crime story descriptively titled The Quest for the Missing Girl; Taniguchi is adored for his crime comics, although I believe this is the first one released in English that’s he’s also written. Around the same time: Korea as Viewed by 12 Creators, the manhwa sequel to last year’s big anthology. Also up for some undisclosed point in the future (and not listed in that brochure) – a 2000 Taniguchi collaboration with writer Baku Yumemakura about the ascent of Mt. Everest, Summit of the Gods.

Jog also quizzically notes that they plan to release the remaining seven volumes of “The Times of Botchan” before the end of the year. Is the “Nartuo influence” to blame?

Cosplayers get the spotlight twice this weekend, first in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin’s preview of Kawaii Kon 2007, and then in New York magazine’s “Look Book” fashion feature.

The Star-Bulletin article takes a Cosplay 101 approach, gathering tips from veterans — “The first costume should be an easy one, not real complicated” — and delving into the communal aspects of the hobby.

But New York’s feature is all about the fashions. You’ll likely recognize Chris and Niki Notalire — Blue Beetle and Catwoman — from comic conventions and countless website photo parades.

In case you didn’t already feel as if you knew the Notalires from repeated sightings, Chris’ answer to the question, “Do you wear your costumes at home?” will bring you up close and personal.

I’m not big on the Internet meme thing, but I have to say, this might be the best one I’ve ever seen (via Dirk, natch).

Tom talks to Nick Bertozzi about his two new books, “The Salon” and “Houdini,” and also provides what must be one of the worst pictures of the artist in question I’ve ever seen. I mean really unflattering. Anyway:

SPURGEON: There’s a fantastic element to The Salon. What made you decide to use that device rather than stick to a more mundane, historical approach?

BERTOZZI: I thought it might be more interesting visually. [laughs] I thought there’d be more opportunities for hi-jinks and monkeyshines. One idea I had going into The Salon since I was doing it on-line was that each page had to be like [Jack] Kirby. You look at a Kirby page, he’s either invented something, there’s a fistfight or he’s drawn a city underneath the moon or something like that. On every page. I imagine him picking up a page every time he’s finished penciling it and he looks at it, and thinks, “There’s the interesting thing on this page.” And then he goes onto the next. That was my impetus for The Salon, making it kind of fantastical, where there’s these crazy sequences where somebody’s falling through space. Or another crazy sequence where somebody’s inside a famous painting.

Revealing news: Bertozzi will be doing a book with Harvey Pekar about Lenny Bruce. sounds intriguing.

Male bonding, comic creator-style. Mark Millar, you’re up first:

The new issue of Runaways was awesome. I don’t know how he managed to take such a dull, lacklustre series and reinvent himself in a single issue. But this is genius and by far the best thing BKV has ever written. It’s almost like he’s a different writer.

Brian K. Vaughan? Your response?:

Been meaning to congratulate you on Angelina Jolie starring in Wanted! I knew she was into charity, but donating her time to a movie conceived by a “special needs” creator may be her most generous gesture yet.

Sorry I didn’t congratulate you sooner, but I was busy writing my own adaptations of my comics (which is what movie studios allow REAL writers to do).

Still the medium’s most disease-free writer,
BKV

Mr. Millar, you have thirty seconds to respond:

Sorry, chum, but according to my medical dictionary oral chlamydia is still considered a disease. Still, Axel gave you a four issue Wolverine mini for your troubles. I hope your first taste of proper royalties soothes the tears a little.

CBSNews.com has a brief article about the much-discussed “makeover” for Archie and the Riverdale gang, apparently culled from a Saturday Early Show segment.

It’s fairly standard, and relatively information-free, stuff, until we get to this little exchange between Early Show host Tracy Smith and Archie Comics chairman Michael Silberkleit:

Betty and Veronica are getting the most dramatic makeovers: long, voluptuous hair, softer features, but also their new fashions bare more skin that Riverdale High is used to. Low-riding jeans on Betty?

“They do look a little sluttier,” Smith told Silberkleit.

“No, not sluttier,” he said.

“Don’t you think they look like they have a little less clothing on?”

“No, this is the way kids dress today!”

The art-style change — planned for just four issues — begins with Betty & Veronica Double Digest #151, due in stores May 14.

More Spider-Man 3 news, as we get closer and closer to the big opening weekend.

This past weekend’s box office was fairly weak, with no film making over $10 million. Box Office Prophets says it’s the calm before the storm:

There was certainly nothing to get excited about at this weekend’s box office, as young and old saved their pennies for what looks to be a quality blockbuster in Spider-Man 3. No films managed to crack the $10 million mark, as we end up with a three-weekend winner in Disturbia. The box office was so bad overall, Sony’s comic book marvel could end up breaking the original’s record next weekend. In fact, the box office was so slow, that advance tickets for the webslinger probably would have made a top five appearance if counted at the box office this weekend.

Which leads me to my Spider-Man 3 question of the day that no one will answer: Have you bought your tickets yet?

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It’s pretty unusual to find blogworthy items of a non-political bent related to comics at The Huffington Post. That said, Joel Keller, whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post and Salon, posted a glowing review of the Cooke Brothers’ film, Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist, that debuted last Thursday at the Tribeca Film Festival on the Post Web site.

Typically, I’d hesitate posting a link to an early review, but I thought Keller’s piece was an obvious exception to the rule, largely because he has no great interest in comics at all, save the recent Sin City movie and enjoying Spidey comics via The Electric Company as a child some three decades ago.

Summing it up from Keller’s review: “The sign of any good documentary is if it makes a person who wasn’t a die-hard fan of the subject or genre it’s exploring want to learn more. And Portrait does just that.”

If you enjoyed seeing Kevin Melrose’s early Iron Man pic as much as I did, you’ll probably like this Paramount promotional shot of Robert Downey, Jr. that accompanied last Friday’s first look feature in USA Today too.

One interesting factoid: Iron Man opens May 2, 2008, just about the time Free Comic Book Day comes around again. And, you won’t be surprised which mainstream superhero publisher Downey prefers…

On her MySpace page, Jo Chen makes Faith fans very, very happy by revealing the cover to Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 #6.

Related: AfterEllen.com looks at the new series.

Writing for the Nashua, N.H., Telegraph, Jen O’Callaghan and Sandy Bucknam debate one of the most important issues of our times: Which superhero girlfriend is cooler — Lois Lane or Mary Jane Watson?

Aside from that teeny, tiny flaw of not being able to place the bespectacled Clark Kent as her Man of Steel, Lois embodies so much of what I aspire to – a strong, independent woman with talent, intelligence, wit and ambition.

From what I’ve gathered from the “Spider-Man” films and a cursory search of the Internet, M.J. is a moderately successful actress and highly successful fashion model. She puts up a front as a party girl and famously told Parker on their first face-to-face meeting in “Amazing Spider-Man” No. 42, “Face it, tiger. . . . you just hit the jackpot!”

Oh, she’s modest, too? I guess Parker really did hit the jackpot.

It’s a tough call if we’re talking about All-Star Superman Lois versus Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane MJ. But if it’s “regular universe” Lois versus “regular universe” MJ … I don’t care.

The Chicago Tribune’s Metromix.com takes a look at Hispanic super heroes from a variety of media, including Nickelodeon’s new El Tigre cartoon and DC’s Blue Beetle comic:

It’s part of a 21st Century wave of multicultural offerings for kids that have birthed heroes of many different races and ages. Meanwhile, the two big comics publishers, DC and Marvel, have promoted non-white heroes in high-profile books such as “Fantastic Four” and “Justice League of America.” Further, more heroes of color star in their own monthly series. While many of these new monthly comics struggle saleswise, a few have garnered critical buzz, including “Blue Beetle,” which follows the evolution of Jaime Reyes, a Mexican-American teenager who discovers an alien blue scarab that allows him to generate a coat of super-powered blue armor. Unfortunately, the suit doesn’t come with an instruction manual.

Blue Beetle writer John Rogers says he hopes that in 10-15 years, “a Hispanic kid is going to take over writing ‘Blue Beetle’ — or start writing his own comics — because he feels that the medium is accessible to him.” Also be sure to read Greg Hatcher’s description of some of his stduents reading an issue of Luke Cage.

Usmagazine.com looks at the international posters for Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer and wonders whether Jessica Alba was subjected to the Photoshop treatment:

As expected, Alba … sports her character’s trademark blue eyes and blonde hair, but what was surprising was the fact that the actress’ tawny skin tone appeared to have been lightened by several shades and her jaw line had been slimmed.

The result was more along the lines of a Denise Richards/Claire Forlani hybrid.

Although no studio representatives would comment, “insiders” say the image wasn’t doctored.

The Los Angeles Times also looks at the increasing popularity of light novels and other prose works based on manga and anime properties:

The simplest are straightforward retellings of adventures from the original graphic novel or animation.

[snip]

Other authors use familiar characters in new stories, adding plot twists not found in the drawn and animated versions.

Japanese writers and readers describe these books as “light novels,” recognizing that they’re not serious literature. In English, they read like a cross between the pulp fiction of the ’40s and the juvenile novels of the postwar decades. Yet the manga characters often display greater depth. Nancy Drew never had to choose between violating an oath never to kill again and preventing a coup d’etat that could result in thousands of deaths, as Kenshin does.

Tokyopop Publisher Mike Kiley tells the newspaper, “”This year, we’ll publish about three dozen novels, and probably between 40 and 50 in 2008. This is a major commitment for us.”

The Los Angeles Times has a lengthy profile of Frank Miller — “the most important comic book artist of the last 25 years” — covering everything from his Hollywood success with Sin City and 300 to reaction to The Dark Knight Returns and All-Star Batman and Robin to the status of Holy Terror, Batman!

The book is still not out, and in the industry there is the general sense that the project has stalled a bit. At the W, though, Miller said about 120 pages of his Batman tale have been drawn and inked and he’s starting in on the “final 50 or so.” He said he plans to finish it even though he senses squeamishness by executives at DC Comics and its parent, Warner Bros. Entertainment, in sending a franchise character on a blood-quest after terrorists. The topic is clearly an uncomfortable one for him, and he gave the impression that the title, the distribution deal and the nature of the project are in flux.

Still, the plot is decidedly straightforward: “Our hero’s key quote is, ‘Those clowns don’t know what terror is,’ ” Miller said. “Then he sets out to get the guys.”

With the hero as terrorism avenger, Miller is pointing to the days of comics in the 1940s, when Superman, Captain America and the Human Torch were drawn taking punches at Hitler or Hirohito.

“These terrorists are worse than any villain I can come up with, and I think it’s ridiculous that people in entertainment are not showing what we are up against here…. This is pure propaganda, a throwback, there’s no bones about it.”

Miller also said he relishes a backlash. “I’m ready,” he said, “for my fatwa.”

Related: “Miller’s biggest hits”

SFGate.com’s Culture Blog has not one but two videos up from last week’s APE convention. The first one features commentary from various folks on the showroom floor, including Keith Knight, Gene Yang and Jose Cabrera:

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Is this the very definition of a slow news week? With the exception of our own JK Parkin’s APE report, it’s been a surprisingly quiet last seven days. I mean, when one of the most interesting stories of the week was that scientists have discovered real-life kryptonite, you know that nothing’s happening. Not that that stopped DC from trying to capitalize on the discovery, as the end of their press release about it displayed:

Despite the harmless nature of this world’s kryptonite, Superman is far from off the hook. The first storyline in the newly-launched ongoing SUPERMAN CONFIDENTIAL series, from writer Darwyn Cooke (New Frontier) and artist Tim Sale (whose work has been featured on NBC’s “Heroes”), revealed a new take on Superman’s first encounter with the malicious mineral, and how it affected a young Superman’s early career as a hero.

The mineral, which is a potential source of lithium and boron, will be put on display tomorrow at the West London museum. Reports that the mineral will be encased in lead are unconfirmed.

See how they subtly mentioned their book in there? You could hardly notice.

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